Pretending to Train Just for Fun

I've been riding as usual (to you that means I've been playing on my bikes way more than a person should be allowed). I spend days off "pretending" to train for some up coming event, but in the end I find that I am easily distracted by nature's simple artwork along the way...



I still ride as hard as I can (almost exclusively on single speeds now) in effort to rebuild muscle back to where I was before last fall when an unexpected back injury caused my left leg to loose a huge amount of muscle mass. I still have a numb lower left leg about half the time and I am still missing an entire muscle in my upper left leg. I fear that the nerve damage at these two areas has been too great for complete recovery...I'm trying to be patient since it can take up to 2-years to regenerated some nerve tissues, but at this point I am seeing little to no improvements which gives me the doubts. However, I am moving forward and taking advantage of every other muscle fiber in my bum left leg to compensate my form back into some kind of competitiveness (I hope). In the end it does not matter since I am what I am (got spinach?), plus I'm happy with where I've come back to at this point.



This weekend I'm off to play with some friends from Sandpoint, ID in the Spokane 24-hr race...this year I'm on a so called "we're-just-riding-for-fun-and-not-racing-team" (we'll see if that is true). Either way, competitive or not, I'm looking forward to a great time with good friends. Next week I'm heading up north again for the Adventure Sports Week 8-hr mountain bike race. It was fun last year so I thought I would try it again, but this time on the single speed...hmmm

Body-Wide Systems Shut Down

I've been feeling a tad down lately, as in body-wide systems shutting down...I've been totally unmotivated and have had to force myself onto a bike (never been a problem before), plus pedalling started a whole new pain scenario screaming from my legs and the muscle pains continued after my rides. One side of my brain said, "Let's go for another Spring ride and look at the flowers" while another part of my brain was saying, "Oh no, we're not going anywhere, can't you feel the pain from those stupidly fast daily 5000-ft climbs you do on, of all things, a Single-Speed bike!" Oh but the flowers...


I even tried my geared bike to see if it would ease the pain issues while pedaling...didn't help at all and in fact I felt like it was more of a struggle pedaling the geared bike vs. the single-speed (yes, weird).



Then a few nights ago the pain in my stiff, heavy-feeling, useless, aching leg muscles woke me up and got me thinking about this dilemma...it seems to have started the previous week when I started hacking up lung crud, but that's essentially cleared up except for the occasional, spontaneous monster-crud-yuk-boogy-thing that seems to come from no where deep in the lungs. Then for some reason during this middle-of-the-night self debating session I had an instant hunger for a hamburger...that's weird I thought. But wait, maybe there's something to this, which got me thinking about my diet lately which was mostly non-meat meals. Hmmmm...sore legs, hard workouts climbing hell-hills on a single-speed, and very little to no protein intake for several days...can you say duh! So the next morning I started focusing on better protein intake, which brought about an amazingly fast recovery from the sore legs.



Today I got on the SS bike, felt awesome, climbed over 6000-ft and was ready for more except I had run into snow and I had some time constraints. Lesson learned...schools out!

Wool + Snow + Mud = Spring

At home I was contemplating my clothing needs for the day - it's always a dilemma to figure out what to wear and pack for the weather. After nervously walking outside several times to test the temps (which does nothing to plan for conditions 5000-feet higher) I finally settled on a wool long-sleeve with 2-more long-sleeved layers in the pack along with a windproof beanie for today's ride. Better to have too much I thought vs too little and getting cold up there (hah - little did I know what the day had in store for me). I had some insane adventure plan to ride up Lick Creek to the top, then ride Pinkham Ridge Trail back to some unknown point that would drop me back down towards the bottom of Lick Creek.

The plan was insane since the day previous I was up there and ran into some spring muck-snow (that's mud + snow to you), but I was not dressed well enough for the coolness and I had the wrong gear on the SuperFly SS (needed something easier for the snow to keep from spinning out so much). So I came home yesterday feeling a tad defeated. Hmmm...

At the last second I also decided to put some quickie-fenders on the bike since I had a mud bath by the end of yesterday's ride. The Gunnar Think Pink had the gear ratio I wanted so it was the bike of choice today (less fiddling with changing gears means more riding time - so the SuperFly rested today).

After getting part way up Lick Creek Rd, I was happy I had the wool on since the temps seemed to steadily decrease, then it started snowing - I was smiling big because this was soooo cool!!!




On the way up I ran across some tracks on the road - Mama's first...


...then baby's


I also found some flowers trying to grow in the white, cold patches...




Up on top the views were misty and totally jaw dropping...




I still got some mud, but nothing like the day previous.


Just so you know, even though I brought all that "extra" clothing, I still froze my buns off on the way down, but who cares, I had a super great spring adventure on my single-speed.

Finding the Lost Temple

The day after my last ride on the SuperFly SS, I felt that my Gunnar Think Pink was getting lonely...sooooo I took it riding. This time I went up another climbing route (which is all there is around here and I like it that way) to the top of Lick Creek and beyond. I am still quite amazed at how little snow exists above the 5000-ft level. I finally hit some snow at 5400-ft, but was not stopped by it.


The only reason I turned around was due to lack of time to continue on (had to get back to pick up the Kevinator from school). On the way back I took a detour down the Pinkham Ridge Trail for some sweet riding and some cool views...but of course I had to stop for some of my favorite spring time flora...


On the way down I rode past this interesting art work that I had not seen before...it's in the middle of no where.


Not sure what to think of it other than someone was mighty bored...maybe a "hunter" from last fall, maybe it's a hippie toker temple, maybe it is a gateway to another dimension...hmmmm.

The smell of purple little flowers is so nice, can you smell these? Maybe that temple is affecting me...

Never Been this High

"Never been this high in April" I was thinking to my self as I pedalled past the 5000-ft level today. Typically there is snow or ice that stops me long before now, but not this year. I'm a tad fearful of the fire season we will have this year with so little snow pack and moisture.


I turned it around when I finally hit a small snow field across the road - an ominous sign that there will be more to come and attempting to go much further will prove futile. The odometer was indicating that I would get at least 70-miles in on this warm, sunny spring day - another great ride on the Fisher SuperFly Single-Speed.



The flowers were spectacular and, as usual, gave me a super-boost in the mental well being...something I needed after working 4-long 12-hr shifts in the ER.




There is still some snow up there feeding Asotin Creek (in the background is the headwaters are of Middle Fork Asotin Creek).

Spokane Riverside

I've spent many hours riding at Riverside State Park just west of Spokane. Most of my many hundreds of miles of mountain biking at Riverside have been done riding in the annual 24-hr race and other past mtb races. I love Riverside Park's many miles of fast, forested single-track trails and I dream of having a riding area like that where I live...after riding such nice trails the thought of moving becomes strong in my nomadic, wandering mind once again. I like green forests and I like dirt trails, that is who I am deep inside. For now though, I have to live in an area with dead, brown, weed infested yuk, and very little single-track trail, but with plenty of dirt/gravel roads to ride. I'll take what I have and enjoy every speck of dirt I can...for now that is.


Fortunately, the Kevinator and I had to make a necessary run to Spokane for some appointments, but our focus was all about having an excuse to ride the sweet single-track at Riverside. We were not disappointed, the trails were buff and in perfect riding condition, the weather was cool and sunny, plus the wild flowers were blooming providing eye-candy everywhere we rode.


The Kevinator insisted on riding the 24-hr race loop, so we did that and more.




The kiddo was exhausted, but happy and smiling big after riding nearly 23-miles this day (we rode 17-miles the day previous - the kid is a mountain biking animal).

Asotin Creek Graupel Ride

I've been mountain biking up on Asotin Creek Trail many times this past winter (not really sure you can call what we had winter though)...every ride has been an adventure in some way. Today was no different, except that I had a riding partner along today to share some spring time adventures. Meet the Kevinator, one lean, mean mountain biking machine...


Together we explored the Asotin Creek trail single track...we rode in sunshine, graupel, and rain...nothing stopped us since the ride was all smiles.



We stopped a few times along our 16-mile ride to enjoy some of nature's spring artwork...hmmmm




It was a perfect MTB day (any day is a good day for MTB rides like this).

Yes, I Stop for Flowers...Kill Bill Episode-II

A true miracle happened today...a MTB group ride! Very exciting since MTB group rides for me seem so rare...partly because of my work schedule, maybe partly due to my lone ranger attitude (Single-Speeds Rule!!!) - OK the real reason is because it has been rather hard to get everyone's (anyone's) schedules to align. But, the SeanMan has a way of sweet talking people (which involves some smack-talk) into group rides. It was a sweet day for a ride and the company was perfect.


There were 3-geared Fisher SuperFlys, my SS SuperFly, plus 3-other Fisher 29ers along and one lone wolf (Doug) on a Salsa Fargo...hmmm suspicious.


At one point when I got behind near the end of the ride the SeanMan was giving me some grief...I did get behind only because I saw a field full of little yellow flowers that as usual just melted me into stopping and dropping the bike to get a closer look...


The SeanMan said something about flowers are for girls, well to me flowers are ultra cool and always worth a stop and look. I'm not sure anyone else really noticed those little yellow beauties flowing by as they focused on the roadway, a bad roadie tendency that I will someday break them of...if they continue to want to ride with me again that is - we unintentionally tried to kill Bill. The SeanMan reminded me that others tried to kill Bill last year also. Sorry Bill, we'll plan for a nicer ride next time, maybe.

I hope everyone had a good day and did not suffer too much. I have plenty of much cooler rides after the snow melts for those interested.

Mountain Bikes Rule!!!

Last month I shamefully rode my geared bikes a total of 2-times...I'm starting to question why I even have geared bikes anymore. Worse is that my road bike has been collecting dust for the last 2-months and even then I've only been on it once this year...shameful. I still find road riding sooooo boring. On the road bike I spend much of my riding time looking at the trash in the ditches just to liven up the ride. Sometimes I stop and investigate a trash treasure, otherwise I just try to avoid the glass from drunks tossing their bottles on the roadway and banana peels from idiot road-toad cyclists. Why do road cyclist feel the need to let everyone know they've been here by dropping those peels? Are road-toads like male dogs marking territory? Why can't roadies just toss the peels in the ditch where they decay and disappear instead of laying on the road side for a few weeks? I have no answer to this after much pondering.

On the mountain bike I find that the gravel road and trail-side scenery much more stimulating than the road trash, glass, and peels...


I find animals, cool bugs, flowers, and more.


Mountain bikes rule in my world.